Cath Update - Isabelle

It's 2:20 p.m., and Isabelle spent 4 hours in the cath lab this morning. It was much longer than any of us anticipated. She has significant narrowing of the arteries on the right side of her heart. They spent time trying to get the cath through but there was just not enough room. They were able to check the pressures in her lungs. They are at 20%...ideal would be 15% or lower but the cath Dr. feels that the surgeon will still do the open-heart surgery with these numbers. Isabelle will likely have more drainage due to the lung pressures...i.e. a longer hospital stay after her open-heart surgery but we're praising God that surgery will be an option.

She is still intubated and has been in PCICU this afternoon. They just took her down for an angio to get more information on her lung vessel system since they couldn't get it with the cath. She should be returning to PCICU in about 15 minutes, when happily!!, I'll get to rejoin her. She will likely stay intubated until this evening. She is completely sedated and doesn't know I'm in the room but it does my "mommy heart" good to be there with her.

Please pray that the heart surgeon, PCICU attending and cath Dr. can coordinate their schedules this afternoon for a meeting to map-out the surgical course for Isabelle. There's a strong chance that Isabelle will just stay in the PCICU until her open-heart surgery. The sooner the surgery the better as far as we're concerned!

Her SAT's are only in the 80's even on 100% oxygen. Once again the Dr.'s are amazed at how well she has done for so long with so little oxygen. I pray that this will be another chance for the Dr.'s, nurses, and other medical staff to the see the Lord's hand in this little life.

We appreciate all the prayers and will try to update the blog several times a day.

(Excuse all the medical stats but I use this as my own medical diary too.)